My father, mother and siblings all threw newspapers for various publications such as the Houston Post, Dallas Morning News and the Houston Chronicle. My exposure to the world of newspapers began in 1969, when my family moved to Longview, Texas.

I spent many early mornings as a youth with family members who worked in the newspaper business. Everyone in my family threw newspapers for part-time income, at one time or another. My mom was excited to found out I was hired to write news for The Courier. She began reminiscing about Longview and shared some of the experiences she recalled of family throwing newspaper routes.

The following is an excerpt from a letter she wrote which detailed some adventures in throwing newspapers:

“Howard, this is what I remember about throwing newspapers for the Longview News-Journal.

I think it was in the fall of 1969 your Dad got an early-morning paper route. The route was wide spread in the Greggton area of Longview. The papers were dropped off for him at an old, small, vacant building in Greggton.

He rolled his papers using another carrier’s tie machine, for a small monthly fee. He threw papers in yards, driveways and put several in special mail boxes for newspapers only.

He also dropped bundles off at small grocery stores. Halfway through the route, he would always stop at a small, closed service station and drink an RC Cola after pouring a package of Lance peanuts inside the glass bottle of soda.

When he finished his route he came home, dressed, ate breakfast and went to work. He was the manager of the Liberty Savings and Loan.

By the time we were all five (dad, mom, my two brothers, and my oldest sister) throwing paper routes, we were all driving Volkswagens. Gasoline was 29 cents a gallon.

It took about $2.50 to fill our Volkswagens. That would last a week before another refill. We eventually bought our own tie machine and set it up in the garage at home. We all used it.

When it was raining or looked rainy, we would roll the papers in a waxed, large paper to keep them dry. We put self-addressed envelopes in the papers once a month.

Those who didn’t mail in, we went to their doors to collect. At that time the cost of the newspaper was $1.50 a month.

Once a year we had a huge newspaper to deliver. They were too large to fold or roll. We put them in plastic bags and just had to drop them the best we could. We all worked together and it took a long time. My route grew to more than 600 papers. I threw it for six years. Before I gave my route up, together we were throwing around 1,600 papers. It was not a hard job and paid good at the time.

Once, I was helping your dad early one morning, throw papers. We ran out of gas. His old Volkswagen had no gas gauge. It had two tanks, when you run out you just switched to the other tank. It was empty that morning.

We both walked to the nearest gas station. At that time all gas stations were closed at night. Your dad had a small container of some kind. He took each gas pump and drained excess gas into his container.

We walked back to the car, put the gas in and finished the route.

That’s all I can remember for now. A lot of things happened. One more thing I can remember.

One morning your dad stopped at a 7 till 11 store. It was closed, but it had a newspaper rack just outside the door. He got out of his car to drop off a bundle of papers and when he went back to his car, there was a dog sitting in the passenger seat.”